The food

Filipino cuisine is the regional cuisines

It’s not just adobo or sinigang. It’s kansi in Bacolod, pakbet in Ilocos and piyanggang in Sulu. This is a short guide to the food of ZamBaSulTa: Zamboanga, Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi.

Coconut charring over an open flame

Where it starts

Pamapa itum

Tausug, noun. Charred-coconut spice paste; the base of Tausug cooking.

Mature coconut is scraped from the shell and charred over an open flame until it turns black, then pounded by hand and ground into a dark, smoky paste. It gives tiyula itum its colour and piyanggang manok its depth. Done well, it tastes of smoke and toasted coconut, never of anything burnt.

Only the Tausug cook this way. It’s slow food by nature, long before the term existed: our marinades and rubs take days, and there are no bouillon cubes in our kitchens.

Our cooking has been trading with Malaysia and Indonesia since the 13th century, and you can taste it in our sambal and our coconut curries. Those flavours blended in; they didn’t replace what was already here.

  1. 01

    Char

    Mature coconut, scraped from the shell, charred over an open flame until black.

  2. 02

    Pound

    Pounded by hand, the way it has always been done in Sulu.

  3. 03

    Grind

    Ground with turmeric, galangal, lemongrass, ginger, garlic and onion.

Glossary

Dishes and ingredients

The Tausug name comes first. Where a dish is on our menus, it says where.

Tiyula itum in its bowl
Piyanggang manok off the grill
The Dulang, seven dishes on one platter
Putli mandi
SoupTiyula itum

Also written tiyulang itum

Beef soup blackened with pamapa itum, smoky and a little sour. Once a dish for royalty in Sulu. Ours at Palm Grill got five stars on the Best Ever Food Review Show.

At Palm Grill and Cabel

ChickenPiyanggang manok

Also written pianggang

Chicken marinated in charred-coconut spice, then grilled. It takes seven spices, among them lemongrass, turmeric, galangal and sakurab, a local cousin of the scallion, where adobo takes a bay leaf.

At Palm Grill and Cabel

Spice pastePamapa itum

Coconut charred black over a flame, pounded by hand and ground with turmeric, galangal, lemongrass, ginger and garlic. The base of Tausug cooking.

PlatterThe Dulang

Seven dishes on one platter, the easiest way to taste the menu for the first time.

At Palm Grill

CurryKurma

Also written kolma

Beef curry stewed in coconut milk and warm spices.

At Cabel

GrillSatti

Grilled beef skewers in a rich red, spiced sauce.

SweetPutli mandi

Purple glutinous rice balls filled with sweet coconut. Putli means princess, and mandi, to bathe. The heroine of Ang Kwento ni Putli Mandi, the children’s book I wrote with Nelson Canlas.

SweetDaral

Thin crêpes rolled around hinti, caramelized coconut.

IngredientHinti

Grated coconut cooked down with sugar until it caramelizes. The filling of daral.

SweetsBang bang sug

Tausug native cakes and crackers, baked or fried. We eat something sweet before the savoury meal, so at a wedding these come out while guests wait for lunch.

At Palm Grill and Cabel

SweetPali kambing

A bang bang sug of overripe saba and lakatan bananas, mashed with flour and brown sugar, deep-fried and rolled in cinnamon sugar. Its shape is said to look like a goat with a scar.

At Palm Grill

SweetTabid-tabid

A braided fried treat. In Zamboanga it’s called chikalang.

SweetLokot-lokot

Also written jaa

Threads of glutinous rice flour, deep-fried and rolled into a crisp, thick roll. Best dipped in kahawa sug.

At Palm Grill

CoffeeKahawa sug

Sulu coffee, strong and earthy, brewed through a cloth “sock” filter.

At Palm Grill

SweetDurian ice cream

Made in our own kitchen.

At Palm Grill

A note on spelling

Pianggang or piyanggang?

You’ll find the same Tausug dish spelled more than one way on menus and in articles: piyanggang or pianggang, tiyula or tiyulang, kurma or kolma. This guide uses one spelling for each and lists the others beside it, so you can find a dish whichever way you’ve met it.

Taste it

Start with the Dulang

Seven dishes on one platter at Palm Grill, the easiest way to taste the food of ZamBaSulTa for the first time. Every dish comes spicy, mildly spicy or not spicy.

Find the restaurantsBook a cooking demo

Book a table at Palm Grill or Cabel